This is a site where I post reviews of CDs, DVDs, LPs, and concerts. I have been writing music reviews on and off since 1984. I ran a heavy metal fanzine from 1984-1988 called Metal Madness and have been a staff writer for Aural Innovations for many years. I have also contributed to Chrohinga Well (RIP), Bad Acid (RIP), Lowcut (RIP), Roadburn and a number of other zines as well. I recently moved to Portugal so please request the new address and do not send any music to Denmark anymore. Tak..

Saturday, August 27, 2011

Fela’s youngest son, is back with his 2nd full length record and this one was recorded in Brazil and mixed and produced in London by none other than Brian Eno. I recently saw the band live at the Roskilde Festival and was blown away. I was so happy to get this double vinyl release. There are two songs on each album side, with the songs all between 5-8 mins or so. Not as short as Femi, his older brother, but not as stretched out as his dad’s songs. But he has the groove and writes some great and powerful political and socially conscious lyrics on this record, which has a great sound. My favourite tracks are Slave Masters, which has a totally cool and almost hypnotic groove that I get sucked into everytime. All the tracks are pretty up tempo except the track Rise, which slows things down a bit. The track The Good Leaf is Seun’s own tribute to marijuana which is father was also fond of. It is a really excellent record and one of my top 10 this year. Get it and if you are in Denmark, Seun plays at Amager Bio in Copenhagen on Oct 28th. I will be there for sure.

White Hill are back and this time with a double vinyl record. The band played a really killer concert at Roadburn earlier this year and probably played a few of these tracks. The Condition of Nothing starts thing soff with a really loud psyched out guitar that is mixed in your face. The band has a slightly more hi fi sound on this record. A very intense track with plenty of distortion. The band sounds more spaced out and like old school Hawkwind like never before with Shazzula (ex- Aqua Nebula Oscillator) adding lots of spaced out sounds on some of the tracks. The track has a more floating ending that leads into the short Movement. This is a strange sort of reverberation piece with a repetitive theme. No other Way closes side A and starts slow and spaced out with drums, synth drones and bass before the delay guitar starts. Nicely building and cool instrumental track. Very spaced out at the end. Side Bstarts with Paradise, an uptempo and repetitive track with some really special synthesizers as the bass and drums (there is no guitar on this track) drive the groove and Dave and Shazzula space out. There are very loud synths on this track that nearly drown out everything at times. Far out. Upon Arrival is what I would call a very typical White Hills track and could have been on any of their previous records but it still is a cool heavy space rock groove track with a nice guitar solo. Side C starts with a Need to Know, a synth only track with a repetitive organ sound and lots of spacey floating layers. It gets very cool at the end and melts into Hand in Hand, which is even more far out sound experimentation. Monument is a very spaced out track with special drum programming by Kid Millions. This as also mixed in a studio in the UK and not NYC like the rest of the record.Side 4 is the real highlight of the record with the side long space rock piece, H-p1.

Spiders are the Swedish band from Göteborg, Sweden that features Witchcraft/troubled Horse guitarist and used to feature Axel from Graveyard on drums but now they have a new guy Richard Harrymon. If you are lucky, the first 75 copies of this 7” come with a limited edition 20min live DVD (with Axel) from Truckstop Alaska, a club in Göteborg. Anyway, the 7” starts off with Fraction.The cover of the Alice Cooper classic, Under my Wheels is much faster than the original and Ann-Sofie is having to really like shout the vocals rather than sing. It was ok but not nearly as cool as the original. The DVD is really well shot and edited but the sound is not that good, with the guitar far too low and just a poor definition of the sound except the vocals. It is cool to check out for the 20mins that it lasts and gives you a taste of the raw energy of the band. Cool release.

This Pharoah Overlord vinyl record was recorded live at the Space Force 1 festival in Lahti in 2010. The band released their set from 2009 by Circle last year, where my band, Øresund Space Collective played the day before. The concert starts with a cover of the song Revolution by Spacemen 3. It is a very very very repetitive guitar riff that sounds slightly like You shouldn’t do that by Hawkwind but it just goes on and on for a bit too damn long. I am not 100% sure but I think all the stuff on this record is new material. Laibela is next and lasts 11 mins long and a bit more rock and roll but also the same riff over and over and it has some singing but it is not mixed in much of a way that you can really understand him at all. I think it is Janne. This track becomes some sort of psychedelic metal track but it is all abit too repetitive and the drums are nearly completely drowned in the guitars and vocals at the end. Crazy sound. Very psyched out. Side B starts with Solar Stomp and is a sort of acid rocker of sorts and the vocal is clearer and you can make out the drums a bit more on this track. Sky is totally insane! The band is just so spaced out and crazy on this one. The sound is really mixed in a far out way that just sort of fries your brain. Insane record… The vinyl is really a beautiful sleeve with gold inlay on the back and front. A nice gatefold. I think it is pressed in only 500 copies so get one soon.

The Dutch band Sungrazer is back with their 2nd record on Elektrohasch. The CD has really nice artwork and a large booklet with lots of pictures of the band in and out of the studio. This album features 7 songs. Wild Goose starts things off and the band enters the CD with a slow jam like feeling before going the singing starts. The track has some really nice spacey guitar at the end but the band doesn’t really take it anywhere. Octo is more like the hard hitting stoner rock the band is known for and this is a pretty short just over 3 mins that might sound like Rotor playing on Colour Haze’s gear and tuning. A very good track. See is an 8 min track where the band return to the Colour Haze sound and vibe. The track starts very slow with a relaxed vocal and the band slow it down to an almost complete stop in the middle and it is very spacey and cool. I like the sound a lot here with the delay guitar, I just wish he would take it to the next level but they don’t. The Colour Haze bass line comes into dominate the next section and they put an effect on the vocal and it reminds me a bit of QOTSA. The end is a bit more psychedelic with the way they mixed the guitar. Goldstrike is a slower and track with a bit heavier guitar riff. Behind is a long 12 min track that sound so much like Colour Haze: the bass sound, the rim snare, slow melodic hypnotic vocal, the build up and then the massive guitar riff (a bit more distorted and nasty sound than Stefan). They give it a bit more of their own twist with the spacey delay guitar that floats over the sound. Very cool. The main riff section is not interesting though and has been heard on a dozen Colour Haze songs. The next section is really cool and spacey with a couple of layers of guitars. I like the transition when the shaker comes in and then they return to their CH style again. The title track, Mirador is next and starts with drums and some spacey delay guitars before the bass line slowly enters the scene. The track builds up but then comes down and is very space again at the end like the beginning and has a very cool surprising strummed guitar mixed in at the end. Nice. 34 and more ends this CD and is like a mix of Colour Haze meets Motorpsycho. I think the hand clapping stuff is a bit strange in this one. The band has made a pretty solid record and fans of Colour Haze who like something more spacey, will dig this band.

Musically this new band from Italy have the feel of Colour Haze but not the Colour Haze/Kyuss sound that the Machine, Sungrazer, etc..and with out the guitar solos and the singer sings a bit like the guy from Samsara Blues Experiment. The album is 4 long tracks in 38 mins. The opening instrumental number starts slow and a bit spacey with some delay on the bass which sounds really cool. At 3½ mins the heavy stoner rock riff kicks in and the band takes off and rocks. Track 2, Enchanting Odyssey is mostly instrumental and features a nice melodic guitar section (simply melodic lines repeated over and over, no real guitar solo). Hang Glider starts with some acoustic guitar and violin to change things up a bit. The mid section of this cool melodic track features some conga drums as well. The closing track is just called I. It is over 10 mins and starts off pretty heavy and intense but still maintains its melodic line. This is a pretty cool album that is mostly instrumental and grows on you with repeated listens.

Ginger is a psychedelic blues rock band from Switzerland. This is their latest release and features a collection of long tracks recorded from their tours during 2010. The sound quality and playing is excellent. The CD starts off with Set the Control for the Heart of the Sun (Yes.. the Pink Floyd song). The band has their own unique take on the track with some nice guitars filling in the spaces. Letters is next and this is a pretty uptempo hard rocking blues track to start and then it slows down with a great guitar solo and takes off again. Drive baby is one of the shorter songs at 6 mins, It is also pretty uptempo and has some nice dual guitar stuff that is pretty spacey. Crosstown Bar Blues is one of the highlights for me on the CD and this is followed by a pure jam and then into a drum solo! Crosstown is old school blues stuff with a great guitar playing. Winds of Dust Part II starts off really funky and has some guitar solos straight away and cool bass and drums as well. It does really feel like you cut into the middle of a song maybe that is why it is part 2? Sugar Mama is next and it is not the old Taste song of the same title ven though it is a blues shuffle style track. I guess this band is a fan of Taste though!The Van Morrison classic Gloria finishes off this CD and is a more hard rock version than most you will here. If you are a fan of the band you will enjoy this and if you are new to the band you will get a good selection of the styles the band is all about. Enjoy..

This is a very special and far out record. I think if you are Finnish you will get a lot more out of this but if you are not, then it is some sort of strange acid dream, where you are floating around in the Finnish forest on mushrooms and seeing small people speaking strange tongues you don’t understand but some how they are telling you something deep. You try to absorb it, take it in but it just twists and deranges your mind further. You hop into the canoe and paddle as fast as you can downstream, hoping the voices will stop haunting you but they won’t go away. Who is this guy and what is he talking out? Is he drunk or on drugs, what is happening to my mind???? Then the record ends..Far out music for trippers… that is all I can say…

Circle has returned with their 4 or 5th release this year. This is an older recording from 2005 from Pori and is a very inspired two song concert where they performed with Träd, Gräs och Stenar from Sweden. Side A is the 20 min long, Satatuhatta. I think this is a really cool piece and Mika is in top form and I love the delay on his voice sometimes. It even features some harmonica but not one is credited on the record as playing it? To me, this piece represents is like psychedelic kraut rock opera for the space cadets. Amazing emotion in his singing as the piece slowly builds up over time and is very intense. There is even some spaced out guitar soloing which is pretty rare for Circle. Wow.. Side B starts off with a very fast section that the band would use a few years later but this does not last long before they start to go into some repetitive and spaced out areas of the universe. They return to the fast section again at the end. This track is 19½ min track that has a similar effect but a bit of a darker feel to it. I was really impressed by this record. Damn cool stuff…

Sunday, August 14, 2011

This was the last night of the Warren Haynes band European tour. It was my daughter’s first real concert. I took her to see Fokatelep last year and she enjoyed that but she is a big fan of Gov’t Mule (the lighter songs mostly) and loves Warrens acoustic music so she was excited. We got some free tickets from my friend Nils. We met Nigel (keyboards) and Ron (bass) near the bus and they were really cool people and in a good mood. I was not sure how many people would be here on Sunday night but the show was starting at 20:15, so that was good.

The band came out at 8:17 and started with a killer version of Tear me Down with a great jam. River’s gonna Rise was next and my daughter loves this song. The sound was fantastic (it was the old Gov’t Mule soundman) and he has a fantastic band. The drummer got to do 4 short drum solos and was very good. It was great to finally get to see Ron Hollaway play with the band. I have many Gov’t Mule shows with him guesting with the band but had never seen the man live! They had several jams in many of the songs, which was great to see and hear. Prince was playing a special late night gig at the same venue so Warren played When doves cry before Beautifully Broken. It was a solid first set with a lot of new tracks and a jamming set closer of 32/20.

Set II opened with Warren alone and he played Glory Road, Working Class Hero and Patchwork Quilt. My daughter was really hoping to hear Forevermore, one of her favourites. After the acoustic set, they did not really excite me with Real Lonely Night and From a Whisper but man; they played a monster version of what is hip and Fire in the kitchen! I love the track Man in Motion but it was not as jammed out as some version I had heard but Warren still played a great solo. The encore was Soulshine, a bit predictable but always nice to hear. A great night.

My daughter wanted Warrens autograph but it was going to be too late to wait after the show but lucky for us Brian (Warren’s guitar tech) gave her one of his pics. Nice. Brian is not looking that well and has put on even more weight than last time I saw him on the MULE tour. Seems to have to almost limp around a bit. I hope he takes care of his obesity before it does him in. He and Warren look like they could be brothers but I hope Warren never gets that heavy. He really needs to lose some pounds as well but man he still plays a mean guitar!A really great night and a 2½hr concert as well.

Set I- Tear me Down, Rivers gonna Rise, Sick of my Shadow, A friend to You, Power and the Glory, Invisible, When doves Cry>Beautifully Broken, 32/20

Set II- Glory Road, Working Class hero, Patchwork Quilt, Roadrunner, Real Lonely Night, From a Whisper, What is Hip, Fire in the Kitchen, Man in Motion, Soulshine.

This was my 4th year in a row coming to Denmark’s best music festival. I am still really surprised that so few people come. I think it was about the same as all the previous years, around 200 people. Thomas and I arrived nice and early on Friday afternoon about 15:30. We could set up our tents, etc.. They were doing some construction so there was a huge mountain of earth where most of us camped usually so they had a new camping area about 400m walk from the festival site in a beautiful area on a hill. Pretty far away if you are drunk at 3 in the morning and have to walk back there in the dark. The weather was quite ok and it did not really look like it would rain today. We had some hassles with cables, etc when setting up the hard disc recorder to record all the bands as we usually do but in the end it worked out and it was all up and running by the time the Diff played.

17:00The first band was Unnamed Unknown from Denmark. They are a young hard rocking aggressive band that worships at the temple of Nirvana. They were ok at first but I grew tired of their Nirvana sound pretty soon. Let’s see where they take the band.

The Diff

18:30 The Danish Grateful Dead cover band, the Diff is starting. More and more people are showing up now and all the Fuzz Manta folks are here except Lene her and the Cherry Overdrive girls will come later. Papir is also all here. The Causa Sui guys are all in a great mood and glad to not be playing at 3 in the morning. The Diff played a really great set, one of the best I have ever heard them play. They opened with Darkstar and played a few of the Dead songs that I actually like like West LA Fadeway and Truckin’. They were really excellent and did not play too long so we can try to keep on schedule. This festival always has too many bands, and too little help for the soundman and time between bands so the last band on, really plays late.

Set List: Dark Star, Sugar Magnolia, Fire on the Mountain, Cassidy, West LA Fade Away, Touch of Grey, Truckin’ The other One, No Fade Away

ET Mumason

20:00 A guy from Iceland, ET Tumason was next and really caught me by surprise. A guy from Iceland playing really southern delta style blues on acoustic guitar with slide. He was very passionate as a singer on some tracks. He also told an incredible story about being strip searched at the Iceland airport after coming back from Copenhagen once and they asked him to play a song after they did not find any drugs on him and he played a song called You’re an Asshole. Wish I had filmed this one. He had his moments.

Causa Sui

21:00 Causa Sui was next and I was really looking forward to this. I had met the Dutch guy who had come to our ØSC concert in Holland and the Germans that had been here the last couple of years and there was even some people all the way from Switzerland mainly to see ØSC and Causa Sui. Cool..The sound man was different this year and he was doing a great job. Sometime the drums and bass were a bit intense in his mix but you could really hear all the instruments well. Causa Sui had the best live sound I had ever hear for them. The new tracks were also cool and it was a good variety of old stuff and one from Summer Sessions as well. One of the German guys said he thought, I think RedValley was like the riff for Electric Funeral by Black Sabbath but just slightly slower and different for the first part of the track.

Set List: New Work, Party Shadow, RedValley, El paradiso, new track, Soladad.

Next up was Basiru Suso, a kora player from Mali. I had seen him play some years ago with Danish guitar player, Michael Nordsø. He was by far the tallest person at the festival and the only African as well. I talked with him a bit and he was super cool. I hope he will jam with us one day. Anyway, he played by himself and it was a really cool change of style and he plays really beautifully on this instrument and sings and also jams away as well. He had the audience really into it at times as well. There is a nice video on you tube.

A blues Rock band that I really like called Blindstone were next. They are from a small town in Jylland in Denmark and there records have been released on a NY label and they have played some special concerts in many places but I have never seen them live. They are big fans of Frank Marino and so I am I and they have even covered one of his songs. I was really looking forward to this and the band did not disappoint but I was really surprised that most of their set was cover songs. The singer and guitarist, Martin, said that was just what they were in the mood for playing and they were a bit rusty! They opened with Are you Experienced by Hendrix and the sound was great. They did an old Journey song called Karma from one of their first three records as well. They played a couple of their own songs and a cool Funkadelic jam which included Red Hot Mama, but they had taken all the funk out of it and made it into a full rock song. I had never heard a version like that. They ended the set with the Frank Marino song, He’s Calling and dedicated it to me. Thanks Martin! They only played about 50mins so we could make up a bit of time.

The Univerzals were the last band on and started at 1:37 according to my clock. There were still 70 people or so and it had not rained at all and it was a little cool but not bad. They played a very good set and for like 2½ hrs until 3:45 in the morning. I think it was nearly all the same songs as they played last year and a lot of the new ones that will be on the next record but since the band had played a lot this year and also rehearsed every day this week they were great. If you don’t know them, they play jamming, psychedelic world music with synths, guitar and saxophone (quite spacey at times) as the main instruments. I crashed out around 3 as I needed to be fresh for my own gig tomorrow at 13.

The Univerzals

Day 2

I was up at 10 and still feeling a bit tired but doing ok. PIB, our drummer will be here in an hour or so. ET Tumason will start the day off today at 11:30 or so.

12:30 Not a lot of people watching ET today and he played totally different songs, which was cool. We are setting up and all is going well and looks we will start on time or even a bit early. PIB injured his hand this morning and it is really swollen up and looks painful. I asked Jakob from Causa Sui if he would play drums or step in if PIB just could not but PIB wanted to play even if he was to suffer. He has a big bag of ice.

15:46 We had a great response from the crowd and it was a very fun concert. We played about 75mins and then Stefan thought we were done and took of his guitar and everyone stopped so we were sort of forced into a 10 min break even though we could play 45mins more. We did come back and play 35mins more and finished on time to keep things on schedule for the festival. Stefan played really great guitar and Nick was matching him with some cool trading solos. We even had a jam on GONG’s Master Builder riff but Thomas did not know the bass line to follow so it went a bit strange but still cool. Rasmus from Causa Sui played synths with us for the 3rd time. I was very happy with our concert and afterwards sold all the 11 vinyl records and some CDs as well to people in the audience. The first set of our was nicely video taped as well. Sadly, someone in the bar cut the power and we lost the hard disc recording. I was actually very mad and upset and just wanted to go home. The sound man was very cool and checked on the internet and it seems you can retrive the file if you don’t record more on the disc so that is what we did and I will try (I was able to retrive the file, only missing the last 5-10mins of our concert, phew!).

The Sensational Psychopoppers were next and this was a new band made of mostly members of the DIFF. I was talking with people and putting my stuff back in Thomas’s car but heard their whole set. It was a strange mixture but some pretty cool rock and roll, with some funk and some psych edge. They seem to be having a lot of fun.

Cherry Overdrive

Cherry Overdrive, one of the crowd favorites at Kildemose were next and now the festival was about 45mins behind schedule and there are still 5 more bands to go. A lot of people in front of the stage for the Cherry Girls, who put on a really solid set and this included a few new songs, one of which had a really funny song title. I enjoyed their set as always but you know what you are going to get. 4 women, playing rock and roll and they psyche out once or twice which is really cool. They could just play it totally straight all the time but they don’t. Respect!

18:30 Strange Forces has not yet started and they were supposed to be on at 17:45. I hope it will not be 3 in the morning when Siena Root plays. Strange Forces are an Australian band living in Berlin. They are a 3 piece psychedelic rock band. They started off their concert very powerful like a steamroller and hawkwind with a lot of phazer on the guitar, which was really cool. I was pretty blown away. They slowly became much less intense and played almost like post rock like stuff that was very melodic and much less heavy than the way they started with a very heavy groove and phased out guitar. Still, a pretty cool band and I had never heard of them before.

Siena Root has arrived and they are all in a good mood and I was really surprised to see that they had Sanya as the singer. Wow.. she is amazing and has not been singing with them for some years now. Cool….

21:30 The Croatian band, Fjodor was next and I was really looking forward to seeing them again. They no longer have the sax-synth guy from Seven that Spells but a new young synth kid. They played a lot of new songs and some had quite funny titles, like Astral Erection! The synth guy said some really funny things between the songs. They had a song about Tsunami and it had a crazy intro and then a real Ozric Tentacles like guitar line. People were really into it and they played a cool set and really different from the last time. The guitar player he was more in the background the sax took the lead in the old line up but now he was stepping up and playing a lot more lead guitar and really freaking out sometimes like Niko from Seven that Spells!

Ramgoats

22:45 Ram Goats are just stating to play now and we are 1½hrs behind schedule. They had a lot of gear and always take a long time. There is the most people I have seen yet today for the band, who play their own style of Reggae but are really good at it. Nice to have some reggae that is not some crap dancehall or real super polished stuff. A good band but they always throw the time schedule off a lot. They should be the last band of the night next year!

00:10 Ram Goats are finished now and Vomit Supreme has to set up and play. Siena Root was suppose to play at 01:00 so it will be really late now. I was lying down in my tent for Vomit Supreme and really tired so I did not see them at all or take any pictures. It was feeling like it was going to rain now and the sky was very dark with clouds as well. Sure enough it started before Vomit Supreme was over. They played really high energy rock and roll. It is really pouring down now.

02:00 Sometime after 2 Siena Root started and it was still raining. Besides Sanya they also had the guitar player with the dreadlocks nearly to the ground. They opened up with long instrumental Rasayana. The set was very heavy on the older songs like Trippin’, The Rat, Coming Home, etc.. Waiting for the Sun was played also. Another long space out jam on Reverberation. KG did not have the sitar with them though but he could play a lot of keyboard when necessary because of the 2nd guitar player. This is a really good line up of the band. People really were into it, even though it was wet, raining and shit weather.

Set List: Rasayana, Dune/Trippin, Waiting for the Sun, The Rat, Reverberations, Words, Little Man, Until time leaves us again, Coming Home, Nightstalker, Jungle Funk (these were all the songs on the set list but I was not awake to hear the end of the show)

Day 3

Usually Kildemose is over but this year they decided to have 3 bands play on the Sunday as well while everyone is packing up and stuff. A older spiritual fellow named Tommy Tilopa played for like 45mins at 11 while we were having some breakfast and packing up our tents and stuff. Very laid back stuff.

12:15 Papir hit the stage for a set up instrumental psychedelic rock. There were not that many people watching them, about 40, I guess but they were excellent. This is a band to really watch for. They have a new album out later this year on the Causa Sui label. I am not sure what the set list was and we had to leave before they finished as I had to meet my daughter by 17 and go see Warren Haynes tonight.

This was musically the best Kildemose ever and I really hope we can recruit many more people from Copenhagen to come next year. I would really like to see some more African music again, maybe Whoareyoupeople, a Copenhagen afrobeat band could play. Get one or two bands from Malmö, like the Carpet Knights, SKL or Technocolor Poets. Spids Nøgenhat.. You never know. Special thanks to Jan, the soundman, and the great video crew and all the friendly people from Fyn who volunteer their time to make this a great festival. See you next year.

I was in Finland visiting some friends with my daughter and we decided to go to this small forest festival. It was the last of 3 days of the festival and very much oriented towards families. We arrived around 13 in the afternoon and stayed until 18. We heard the Zambian Vocal Collection which was ok. Funny to hear one of the guys speak Finnish! We had some food and walked around. There was a drumming thing on one stage and we heard some of the ska-reggae band, the Capital Beat on the same stage as the Zambian group. We also spent some time sitting down in a cool round house where it was like a battle of the bands with 10 different acts of solo people who all played two short songs and they had a panel of judges and also used the reaction of the crowd as well. That was funny to see some of these groups. We also went into a meditation tent where a guy was playing a wooden flute, another some bells and stuff. People were really chilled out in this tepee. Cool. The last act we heard was some of Jukka Pioka, another Finnish reggae artist. IT seem to be a mix of some world music as well. A really fun and kids friendly festival with a lot of Finnish hippies and dreadlock kids.You can see more pictures at this link: Faces Festival Pictures

This is a very unique, one of a kind music festival and my band, Øresund Space Collective were so honoured to be the main headline act on the space rock stage. They had two scenes at this festival. A tent for the space rock and an outdoor area for GOA trance DJs.. The festival was two quite different music scenes combined at one festival: GOA trance and psychedelic and space rock bands on the other.

I arrived on Friday afternoon with the band and was really looking forward to this night to get to see Quantum Fantay and Dream Machine on this night. I was driving the van and the festival site was quite muddy as it has been raining for weeks and it was not that warm today either but the sun was coming out and it looked like it would clear up even though more rain was expected tomorrow. Anyway, we got stuck in the mud and a guy had to come with a tractor and pull us out. After that we set up our tents in the backstage area and I tried to set up the hard disc recorder to record all the bands on the space rock stage. The guys in Dream Machine had arrived as well and were in a really good mood and really nice people. Everyone was smoking joints and in a good mood.

Rivercrest

The first band of the day was Etherik. Some of the members of this band would also play in the next two bands as well. They played a kind of psychedelic rock. They had a very energetic drummer. I really liked the next band a lot and they wanted me to come and make some spacey sounds with them but it was a lot of work to set up the hard disc recorder with the great sound tech lady, who was so cool and helpful over these two days. I would have had only 10mins to get my stuff so I passed but damn, if I had more time, I would have for sure as this was a damn cool 90min show of mostly improvised stuff with three guitar, bass, drums and a guy who played Fender Rhodes and trumpet as well. Later a young sax player joined them. We only had 14 channels to make the hard disc recording and some channels were not recorded for some bands, like the trumpet and sax for this band. Great stuff.

Wheel of Smoke

Quantum Fantay

Wheel of Smoke were a 4 piece Belgium band as well and they have produced one CD. They played about 90mins and also a pretty cool band. I was not really into the guys singing style, sort of forced and angry but they could really rock sometimes and had a nice psychedelic sound, especially the lead guitar player was really cool. They played a bit too long and Quantum Fantay with their own roadies, professional flight cases for everything, etc.. took a long time to set up and now the festival was nearly an hour behind and they have a strick curfew at 04.00 that it has to be quiet for 2 hrs until 6 am! Anyway, I had never seen this instrumental Belgium act who is highly Ozric Tentacles inspired. They played quite a few songs from their new record and they got Jon (Dream Machine, ex-Ozrics) to play flute on one of their tracks but his solo was very short and had to fit into their almost pre-programmed and very tight sound. The band is very good and professional but they are just too squeaky clean and smooth, they need some grit, some edge to their sound and performance. I really liked some of their stuff a lot but other times it was too much the same and I was a bit bored. It is all just a little too predictable. They have a great groove and people were into it and the tent was the most packed for any band at the whole festival, with about 120-150 people, so they must be doing something right??

Occasionally, I would pop over to the techno scene to see what has happening and there was never more than about 100 people dancing and checking out the DJs. Everyone was smoking and having a great time and smiling. The scene was very cool and had great sound as well and not too loud. The visuals late at night were really good.

It was nearly 3 in the morning when Dream Machine was finally up and playing. The band seemed fresh and was really happy to play. I was dead tired and struggling but I enjoyed them a lot. A long reggae space piece as the 2nd number was a bit of surprise but cool. The songs from the bands last CD sounded really great. The first and last songs were from the first CD. I think the band would have played longer but they were forced to stop a little over 4 as the police were outside. They are all really good players in this band and even though the main synth player was missing, they did well. Alex is a great guitar player although some people think he is too much liked Ed Wynne. I don’t see it that way though.

The techno music started start away at 6 fucking am in the morning. I had to get some sleep and took a sleeping pill and the band woke me up at 13:30 as they wanted to make a day trip to see the ancient Belgium city of Brugge. SO up and off we went. We had a nice afternoon there but I forgot my camera! We got back around 18 and just missed G-delic’s set, which was the bass player and synth player from Dream Machine. People said it was chilled out and pretty cool. Damn.. I had really wanted to see them.

Nukli was up next and these were really nice older guys (with a young new drummer who stepped in for the gig) and we talked a bit before and after. This is one of those bands that I just never dreamed I would ever get to see. I have the Time Factory CD and some of their old cassettes as I am a huge fan of the 80s UK festival scene music that spawned Ozrics, Magic Mushroom band, Nukli, Omnia Opera, Mandragora and others. Anyway, I was surprised Nukli was just three guys but damn, they were cool with lots of great guitar playing and cool songs. They played about 70 mins, I think. Sadly, this was the most empty I had seen the tent since the early part of the first day. I guess 50 people saw Nukli play. One of the main organizers, Mathias, he was here and very much into it!

It took a while to set Omnia Opera up and things were running a bit late now. They were suppose to start at 22 and it was nearly 22:30 or so before they started. Wow… This band was great and the original singer still really had the same exact voice, he sounded great. They originally had like two female singers and this line up only had one and she did not sing all that much. They played a very powerful full on heavy space rock set. The set was a lot of new tracks. The band opened with Second Skin, which was on the Seeking the Elusive release after Red Shift when the band had just become Omnia. I filmed a half of the track Nothing is Ordinary. See the youtube clip. They played two songs from their debut record (they had many cassette tapes before this), Floating Settee and Space Bastard. They did not play anything from Red Shift, their 2nd and last album. They band was suppose to have the new CD for this gig but the artwork did not get finished. Anyway, it was a great powerful set and they had their own guy making some projections which was cool. The stage and tent was already cool when it became dark with these green lasers, and stuff.

It was 1:25 by the time we were all set up and ready to fly into space. As you can see from the set list below, were were into long jams this night, as we only played 5 jams in 2½ hrs. Alex Pym from Dream Machine replaced Nick on guitar during the track called Exploration. We were really well received by the crowd of about 100 people or so and some who had seen us before thought it was our best concert. It was great fun and we really played some cool stuff but sometimes it took us a while to get there.

We had to leave to go home so we did not see any of the bands that played on Sunday but the techno started right away at 6 am, 1½hrs after we crashed. Crazy… Thanks to Chris for the set list info and audience recordings on dimeadozen and Mathias the organizer for putting so much effort into this super cool small festival. I hope that it can grow. The link below is to see more pictures of the festival.

This was the 2nd time we played in one of the worlds smallest clubs, Sub071. Why in the world would we drive 750km to play in a place that holds 30 people? Well, because it is a very cool underground place and the people who run it and show up are really really cool. As was the last time, we were stuck in traffic in Germany for some hrs and what should be an 8 hr drive turns into 11 hrs! Jack and his gang have food and drinks for us, which is really cool and we are not too late. We set up and then Max Headroom set ups. We have some food and beers and listen to Max Headroom. I could not get into the room to see them and take a picture but damn, this was a cool instrumental band playing psychedelic stuff. Very cool organ driven space outs. The closest band I could compare them to would be Uran! That is how special it is. Cool stuff. I am not sure what time we started to play, I guess around 11 and we played for a little more than 2hrs. Some people had driven or taken the train from Germany and the north of Holland to see us as well. Cool. I think we played a pretty damn cool and psychedelic concert and the people were packed into the place and enjoying it. Magnus was on fire on the guitar this night. I think the best track of the set was the very last one of the concert, so maybe we needed to just keep playing. Usually we take set breaks but we played just straight for 2 plus hrs and then called it quits. A quite fun night. Check out the pics and the recording at the links below.

Saturday, August 13, 2011

The Danish psychedelic rock band recently played their last concert and released this gatefold double 7” with the last of the new material the band had been working on the last few years. While the band has not been that active the past many years, they have created a great back catalog of music that has changed the Danish psych scene forever. Each of these double 7”’s has unique artwork produced by the band and friends over the past many months. It also has a fully autographed insert with your edition number. It was hard to choose a few to keep as they were all so cool. Anyway, each 7” contains one track and it all starts off with 13 is just a number. This track starts with some hand clapping and some very freaky guitar stuff and has a very raw and psychedelic sound. Flaws is a slower more spacey psych song and it even has some samples. Bo’s voice is still very unique and he sounds great. Cool stuff. Now pull out the 2nd 7” and you have Bolt of Force. This track is much like some of the material on their last studio record, Forever. A mid paced melodic track with the same great dual psych guitars that Henrik and Bjarni meld together to create that special melodic spacey On Trial psych sound. No Beginning is the last song and it has a guitar theme similar to one of the bands older tracks from Head Entrance (I think). Another cool song and this is a cool way for this band to end with some pretty damn cool psychedelic tracks.

This is quite an interesting and intense release. These sessions took place a few years back and feature Ron Schniederman from Sunburned hand of the Man. A limited edition CD-R from the older Causa Sui line up plus Ron and Jørgen Teller was released a few years back on the There is no Trouble in Denmark label. This record was however recorded at the bands studio in Odense and has a better sound but also quite raw and in your face production. Side A starts with an 11 min track called Pewt’r Wozniacki with a very repetitive rhythm and it slowly builds and some spaced out sounds and samples and stuff come out on the left channel as the driving guitar rhythm sticks to the right. It makes it quite psychedelic. Suddenly, the guitar riff gets really heavy and Jonas plays a very psyched out guitar as it really gets intense and grows. At the end both Ron (from Sunburned hand of the Man in the left channel) and Jonas (right channel) plays solos and it very cool stuff. May Sun is a much shorter piece at 4 mins that is very laid back and has spacey guitars and synths. Really nice. Masted Milk (what kind of milk is that?) has Ron’s guitar with a very mutilated and tortured sound as he goes along with the bass and drums as the track slowly builds. Jonas comes in after a bit and plays a cool heavy riff and also some great soloing as well. Damn cool jam. Streams of Gratitude starts side B with a looping synth rhythm that slowly fades in and the track begins. A lot of subtle trippy stuff is happening in the background on this track if you listen carefully at high volume. A really cool guitar solo is played as well. Mating call is the main 11 min track on this side. This track is really extreme stuff with wild guitar playing and pounding drums by Jakob! Latte Rock starts pretty spaced out with some freaky synth and other sounds and then Jakob comes in on the drums to drive the track forward. You sit and wait for the loud guitar or heavy riff to kick in but it never does. Sure they come back with the guitars but in a very slow spacey vibe. Cool.

This was pressed in 500 copies on vinyl and already sold out at the source but you can probably still find it around at some mail order places. It is also released in the USA on the Spirit of Ohr Records. If you are a fan of the band like some of the heavier stuff, then check this out! Oh yeah.. Volume 2 just came out..

About Me

I am a research scientist doing Diabetes research and I do music journalism on the side and have been writing about music for 28 years now. I also lead an all improvised psychedelic space rock band called the Øresund Space Collective. I also am an avid collector of music.